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Following the tragic attack in New York City, President Donald Trump announced that he wants to end the Diversity Visa Lottery Program saying, “We’re going to quickly as possible get rid of chain migration and move to a merit-based system.”

His response to the attack is not only misguided and based on fear, but it is also exploitative, seeking to further his administration’s attempts to curtail immigration. When the president uses phrases like “chain migration,” he essentially wants to make it more difficult for families to immigrate and stay together. Language matters.

We fear that ending the Diversity Visa Lottery Program may signal the beginning of other policies aimed to keep people apart.

We at CIVIC, Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement, strongly condemn the Trump administration’s plans to expand immigration detention. As reported by USA Today, ICE has put out requests to identify privately-run jail sites in Chicago, Detroit, St. Paul, Salt Lake City and southern Texas.

The move will only serve to embolden Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in targeting vulnerable communities and line the pockets of profit-driven companies like GEO Group and CCA, at the expense of the lives of thousands of individuals and their families. The proposed expansion is also a waste of taxpayer money.

We successfully fought to stop the expansion of for-profit immigrant prisons in California. Earlier this month, Gov. Jerry Brown signed the” Dignity Not Detention” bill (also known as SB29) into law, following the tireless work of immigrant rights organizations and advocates, including CIVIC, and through the help of people in detention, who bravely shared their stories with us.

California’s measure is a step in the right direction toward ending our inhumane detention system and one that can serve as a model for other states in their fight to thwart the Trump administration’s unconscionable actions.

In fact, we worked with Democratic Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal from Washington to introduce a first-of-its-kind federal budget amendment to stop immigration detention expansion nationwide. We hope to work with more legislators like her to one day abolish the U.S. immigration detention system.

#SCHOOLSNOTPRISONS ARTS AND MUSIC FESTIVAL COMING TO ADELANTO, FEATURING PERFORMANCES BY MIGUEL AND EMCEED BY CRISTELA ALONZO

The #SchoolsNotPrisons tour and community partners will call for the closure of cruel and unjust immigrant prisons, beginning with the for-profit prison in Adelanto which is the largest immigrant prison in California

ADELANTO, CA (October 11, 2017) – Grammy-winning R&B artist Miguel will headline Friday’s free community Schools Not Prisons concert joined by Los Rakas, Ceci Bastida and Buyepongo to advocate for the closure of all immigrant prisons. The event will be emceed by comedienne Cristela Alonzo. The concert comes just two weeks after Governor Jerry Brown signed a new bill by Sen. Ricardo Lara, which will limit the growth of immigrant prisons and takes a strong stand against profiteering by private prison interests.

The #SchoolsNotPrisons Adelanto concert will bring artists, advocates, and community members together for a historical event, creating a unique platform to advocate for the closure of immigrant prisons and shine a light on the many ways for-profit immigrant prisons harm California communities. Centered at the intersection of art and activism, #SchoolsNotPrisons Adelanto will spark meaningful dialogue around the practice of unjust immigrant incarceration and the cruel conditions of immigrant prisons – generally misrepresented as immigrant detention centers.

“Nearly 40,000 immigrants are incarcerated each day in facilities across the United States, with over 70 percent of them held in prisons run by corporations profiting off their misery,” said Christina Fialho, Co-Executive Director of Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC), a national nonprofit that visits and monitors immigrant prisons. “It’s time we close these unnecessary and abusive prisons, and instead use community-based alternatives to ensure immigrants are afforded due process in court.”

The upcoming #SchoolsNotPrisons tour stop is presented by CIVIC, the Inland Empire-Immigrant Youth Collective, the Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice (ICIJ), and produced by Revolve Impact, which has organized the statewide tour since the summer of 2016. The tour promotes a vision of community safety focused on prevention rather than incarceration, and supports local advocacy campaigns that call for more effective, community-based alternatives rather than severe forms of punishment, particularly for vulnerable populations.

“Having grown up on the Mexican side of the border, I’ve always been aware of how much people risk to get to the other side,” said popular Latin singer-songwriter Ceci Bastida, “I’m honored to play for people who are so brave, who have left their home and everything they know to pursue a different life here. We are excited to share our music with the community of Adelanto, stand up for the rights of everyone who is incarcerated at the GEO immigrant prison, and shine a light on this abusive system.”

About 1,600 people are incarcerated in Adelanto’s immigrant prison, which is owned and run by the for-profit prison company GEO Group.

“Conditions inside the immigrant prison in Adelanto are inhumane and abusive, and incarcerated immigrants have launched multiple hunger strikes to protest unclean water and food, denial of medical care, and excessive bail requirements” said Javier Hernandez of ICIJ. “Meanwhile, the CEO of The GEO Group, earns a salary of five million dollars a year, yet GEO pays incarcerated immigrants just a dollar a day to work inside as janitors or cooks.”

The #SchoolsNotPrisons tour stop in Adelanto will take place at the Adelanto Stadium, with gates opening at 5:30pm and the concert starting at 6pm. Guest speakers will include those who’ve been incarcerated inside the Adelanto immigrant prison.

Admission to the concert is free, but people are encouraged to register in advance through this Eventbrite link because the event is expected to reach capacity. The concert is an all-ages peaceful community event, and will be a tobacco-free, alcohol and drug-free zone.

CIVIC is a national nonprofit devoted to abolishing U.S. immigration prison, while ending the isolation of people currently suffering in this profit-driven system. We visit and monitor 43 facilities and run the largest national hotline for detained immigrants. Through these windows into the system, we gather data and stories to combat injustice at the individual level and push systemic change. CIVIC has been visiting and monitoring the Adelanto Detention Facility since 2012. For more information, visit www.endisolation.org and www.endisolation.org/Adelanto.

About The California Endowment

The California Endowment, a private, statewide health foundation, was established in 1996 to expand access to affordable, quality healthcare for underserved individuals and communities, and to promote fundamental improvements in the health status of all Californians. The Endowment challenges the conventional wisdom that medical settings and individual choices are solely responsible for people’s health. The Endowment believes that health happens in neighborhoods, schools, and with prevention. Headquartered in downtown Los Angeles, The Endowment has regional offices in Sacramento, Oakland, Fresno, and San Diego, with program staff working throughout the state. For more information, visit www.calendow.org.

About The California Wellness Foundation

The California Wellness Foundation is celebrating 25 years as a private, independent foundation with a mission to advance wellness for all Californians by making grants for health promotion, wellness education and disease prevention. Since its founding in 1992, Cal Wellness has awarded more than $987 million in charitable contributions, which include matching gifts and 8750 grants.For more information, visit www.calwellness.org.

About Revolve Impact

Revolve Impact is an award-winning social action media and creative company that utilizes radical imagination, art and culture to transform global power, politics and people. Founded in 2014, Revolve Impact provides marketing, campaign management, event production, as well as policy advisement and strategic media expertise to a wide range of influential artists, nonprofit and government entities, corporate communities, and philanthropic foundations. For more information, visit www.revolveimpact.com.

Today, Governor Brown signed SB 29, the Dignity Not Detention Act, into law, effectively freezing the growth of private, for-profit immigration detention facilities in the state of California. The bill also prohibits cities or counties from entering into new, or modifying existing, contracts with private prison companies for the purposes of expanding immigration detention, and gives California community members the chance to weigh in on the construction of any new facilities in their neighborhoods.

Nearly 4,000 immigrants are detained in facilities across California on any given day, with over 70 percent of them housed in for-profit facilities. SB 29 was authored by Senator Ricardo Lara (D–Bell Gardens) and co-sponsored by Assembly Member Gipson, Assembly Member Gonzalez Fletcher, the Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC) and Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC).

“An economy based upon the confinement of people for profit is immoral, and now in the state of California, its expansion is illegal. Governor Brown, Senator Ricardo Lara, the California Legislature, and human rights advocates across the state have come together to pass one of the most important pieces of pro-immigrant legislation in recent history. There is much more work to be done, but this bill is a step forward in the fight to end our costly, inhumane, and unaccountable detention system,” said Christina Fialho, an attorney and the co-founder/executive director of CIVIC.

“When we detain individuals in facilities that seek profit, with no legal or moral standard of care, we are putting people in danger and encouraging inhumane behavior,” said Grisel Ruiz, staff attorney at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center. “With the Dignity Not Detention Act, we will check the growth of private immigration detention where prison corporations quite literally profit from human suffering, as we continue our work to end the unnecessary practice of jailing immigrants altogether.”

Reports of human rights abuses within these facilities are rampant, from physical and sexual abuse and overuse of solitary confinement to medical neglect and preventable deaths. Immigrants involved in the campaign to end private, for-profit detention facilities spoke out against the conditions of detention in California by saying they were unjustly “operating outside of the law,” with experiences of being “abused and tortured,” and feeling that their “religious freedoms were often violated,” and “helpless.”

“This legislation, coupled with AB 103 a new law passed in June, which checks the expansion of public facilities and directs our Attorney General to provide state oversight of all facilities, tells the federal government loud and clear that California will not be a future partner in the expansion of this broken and abuse immigration detention system,”continued Ruiz. “We thank Governor Brown, Senator Lara, and Attorney General Xavier Becerra for listening to immigrants, residents, local law enforcement, attorneys and advocates such as California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance (CIYJA), Immigrant Youth Coalition (IYC), and Human Rights Watch, and for their leadership on this issue.”

The Immigrant Legal Resource Center and CIVIC will work in partnership with formerly and currently detained immigrants and the state’s leadership to ensure full implementation of this bill. The ILRC and CIVIC will continue to fight for additional reforms to immigration detention, including the codification of standards of care across all detention facilities, the creation of extra protections for LGBTQ-identified immigrants in detention, increased visitation access to legal counsel and family members, the increased adoption of community-based alternatives to detention, and ultimately an end to all immigration detention.

For interviews with the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, a key co-sponsor and supporter of the bill, please contact Jareyah Bradley at jareyah@balestramedia.com or908.242.4822.

The Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC) is a national nonprofit that works with immigrants, community organizations, legal professionals, and policymakers to build a democratic society that values diversity and the rights of all people. Through community education programs, legal training & technical assistance, and policy development & advocacy, the ILRC’s mission is to protect and defend the fundamental rights of immigrant families and communities. www.ilrc.org

Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC) is a California-based national nonprofit devoted to abolishing U.S. immigration detention, while ending the isolation of people currently suffering in this profit-driven system. We visit and monitor 43 facilities and run the largest national hotline for detained immigrants. Through these windows into the system, we gather data and stories to combat injustice at the individual level and push wide-scale systemic change. www.endisolation.org

CIVIC regularly receives complaints from people in immigration detention in California. The top complaint is substandard medical care, followed by prolonged detention, and poor nutrition. For a state that currently detains about a quarter of all people in immigration detention nationwide per year, these figures are deeply concerning.

CIVIC Volunteers protest outside of the Adelanto Detention Facility, as part of CIVIC’s Defund Detention Campaign!

Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) just introduced a federal budget amendment to stop immigration detention expansion nationwide. This amendment would prevent the federal government from using any portion of taxpayer dollars to expand the immigration detention regime.

“We are excited to see Congressional democrats moving toward defunding immigration detention. This amendment is the first of its kind at the federal level, and we urge Congress to allow the Amendment to proceed to the House floor,” said Christina Fialho, co-founder/executive director of Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC).

Jayapal’s amendment takes its cue from a law adopted by California earlier this year through the state budget. Earlier this year, CIVIC and the Immigrant Legal Resource Center worked with the California legislature to pass the first law in the country to put a moratorium on immigration detention expansion.

CIVIC consulted on Congresswoman Jayapal’s federal budget amendment, and we are grateful to her for introducing this short and powerful amendment.

To commemorate World Refugee Day (Tuesday, June 20th), over 60 faith leaders and attorneys made a pilgrimage to the Adelanto Detention Facility from Los Angeles to visit with our friends and clients, many of whom had been on a hunger strike the week prior. ICE and GEO Group denied all our visits. In response to a peaceful 5-minute interfaith prayer outside the facility, ICE and GEO Group then put the entire facility on lockdown.

Attorneys and family members who were not part of the pilgrimage and who had already been granted entrance to the facility were expelled from the facility by ICE and GEO Group in response to our prayer. This included young children clinging to their toys who had driven for hours to visits their parents.

“The denial of access represents an ongoing and troubling pattern of retaliation, and raises real concerns about mistreatment of people in immigration detention at this infamously abusive for-profit facility,” said Christina Mansfield, co-founder/executive director of Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC).

This comes just days after 9 men and over 33 women went on hunger strike at the Adelanto Detention Facility to protest substandard medical care, unjustly high immigration bonds, lack of basic respect, and lack of opportunities to connect with family.

“When we see abuse in detention, it is our moral obligation to speak up and stand in solidarity with our friends in detention,” said Christina Fialho, co-founder/co-executive director of CIVIC. “By denying us access after a peaceful and short prayer, ICE has tried to make us choose between our First Amendment rights and visiting our friends and clients in immigration detention. This is not a choice our government can legally ask us to make.”

Christina Fialho, who also is a California attorney, was denied visits with 14 of her clients on Tuesday who were detained at the Adelanto Detention Facility. Fialho had received email approval from ICE in advance of Tuesday for her and 4 of her legal assistants to conduct legal visits at Adelanto. According to the Adelanto Detention Facility rules, attorneys are allowed 24 hour access to their clients in immigration detention. And federal standards require attorneys to have access to their clients 7 days a week without pre-approval; only legal assistants require pre-approval by ICE. To visit at Adelanto through regular visitation hours as a family member, friend, or community member does not require pre-approval from ICE or GEO Group. As a courtesy, our group did provide notice to ICE by email.

On other occasions, GEO and ICE have arbitrarily and without valid grounds denied access to attorneys and visitor volunteers associated with CIVIC in retaliation for peaceful protest activities and public statements protected by the First Amendment.

In November 2015, attorneys and legal assistants were denied visits with people on hunger strike.

In May 2015, GEO Group and ICE prevented Christina Fialho, a California attorney and co-founder/executive director of CIVIC, from visiting her clients after she lawfully exercised her First Amendment rights.

In August 2013, CIVIC’s Christina Fialho and CIVIC visitor volunteers were barred from visiting for over a month at the Adelanto Detention Facility in retaliation again for exercising their First Amendment rights. The ACLU of SoCal and Sidley Austin LLP, pro bono attorney for Christina Fialho and CIVIC, raised concerns about the 2013 and 2015 denials in a letter dated August 24, 2015, which to this day neither GEO nor ICE has responded to or in any way denied.

In January 2017, CIVIC filed a federal civil rights complaint about a general increase in family and community visitation denials at Adelanto.

While CIVIC and allies remain concerned about general visitation denials and these past First Amendment violations, Tuesday’s visitation denials marked a disturbing new Constitutional violation. ICE and GEO Group’s retaliation against the faith leaders violated their fundamental right to free exercise of religion.

“We were gathered at Adelanto Detention Facility to offer our pastoral support, through visitation and prayer, for members of the community in detention. It is unconscionable that the GEO Group and ICE would respond to this intention, of which we had given them notice, with a seemingly retaliatory action by closing all access to the facility. We will remain prayerfully vigilant to ensure that our friends in detention have the right to visitations, and that their spiritual and material care is being taken seriously,” said Rev. Francisco Garcia, who is the Co-Chair of the Sanctuary Task Force of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles and also the rector of Holy Faith Church in Inglewood.

“I find it difficult to comprehend the actions that GEO Group and ICE took in response to our peaceful and prayerful pilgrimage to the Adelanto Detention Facility. Our aim of bringing a bit of healing and hope to those detained quickly became an outrageous display of meanness and injustice. Not only were we prevented from visiting and providing pastoral presence to our brothers and sisters inside the facility, the many families and children who were there visiting were also forced to re-experience the pain of being separated from their loved ones as they were ejected from the building into the 110 degree heat. My hope is that somehow our loving intentions made it past those locked doors at Adelanto into the hearts of those suffering inside. They will not be forgotten and we will be back,” said Rev. Canon Jaime Edwards-Acton, who is the Co-Chair of the Sanctuary Task Force of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles and also rector of St. Stephen’s Church in Hollywood.

“On World Refugee Day, I attempted to visit people in detention at Adelanto Detention Facility so they would know they are not forgotten. As a Unitarian Universalist minister and a person of conscience, I believe all people have dignity and worth. I believe the lives of people in detention are worth fighting for. I ask that Geo Corp, ICE, and the State of California open the doors of this detention center and join us in working for the day when no human being is illegal,” said Rev. Rebecca Benefiel Bijur, a Unitarian Universalist minister in Santa Monica.

“All religions celebrate our common humanity and the sacredness of human life. Inflicting pain or suffering at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity violates this very sacredness. Our religious traditions demand that we welcome the stranger. Detaining people who are fleeing violence in their own countries to seek refuge in ours is going against all we believe. We denounce the ill treatment of people in ICE detention and seek immediate changes to policies that are abusive and inhumane,” said Grace Dyrness with Interfaith Communities United for Justice and Peace.

“Tuesday’s experience of learning more about the suffering of people in detention at Adelanto, being given the name of a hunger striker to visit, and then having the door locked in our faces as we were praying has only increased my determination to work for the release of all those imprisoned in Adelanto. I hope my sisters and brothers inside heard about our big red bus and know the world cares what happens to them,” said Archdeacon Joanne Leslie of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles.

This denial of freedom of religion mirrors the type of abuse happening inside the Adelanto Detention Facility on a regular basis. Women who went on hunger strike last week explain that they often try to pray in circles, holding each other’s hands. But the GEO guards physically break up their prayer circles and threaten them with “the hole,” also known as solitary confinement. ICE has allowed this behavior by GEO Group to go unchecked, despite complaints by people in immigration detention directly to ICE.

“When our prayers are stopped by GEO Group, it makes me feel like praying is something bad,” said one woman who was on hunger strike last week. “But what I say to them is that if being put in the hole is for God, then take me.”

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The pilgrimage to the Adelanto Detention Facility was organized and supported by Interfaith Communities United for Justice and Peace (ICUJP), Sanctuary Task Force of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles, Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC), Immaculate Heart Community, Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice, Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI), Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice (CLUE), All Saints Church Pasadena.

The Riverside Sheriffs’ Association is a 4,000-law enforcement member organization. Their letter of support, addressed the the California Assembly highlights last week’s hunger strikes at the Adelanto Detention Facility. The Sheriffs’ Association also explains:

“Numerous studies have demonstrated that main objective of these Wall Street private prison cash-cows is to maximize profits for their shareholders. For-profit private prison companies accomplish this goal by implementing relaxed hiring standards, reduced staffing levels, inadequate employee training and by paying their workers substantially less in wages and benefits when compared to professional, public correctional peace officers.”

CIVIC wants to thank the Riverside Sheriffs’ Association for their support for this bill!

SAN FRANCISCO, CA. – Today, the California Legislature approved the SB 87/AB 103 budget action, which includes two key provisions that will curtail the growth of immigration detention in California and give the state Attorney General $1 million to monitor all immigration detention facilities in California. This law will be the first in the United States to give a state agency the power to monitor immigration detention facilities and the only in the country to put a moratorium on the expansion of immigration detention in public jails across a state.

The budget action comes as 42 women and men ended their hunger strike today at Adelanto, California’s largest private immigration detention facility. These women and men were protesting inhumane detention conditions, including medical neglect and sexual assault. Just this week, the men were drenched with pepper spray, beaten and transferred into a high security area by private prison guards. The women were threatened with the same treatment.

The budget action prevents California’s municipalities from entering into new contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or any federal agency for the purpose of detaining immigrants in city or county jails. It also prevents the expansion of detention beds in publicly run facilities under existing contracts with ICE, including any facilities housing immigrant children.

The budget action also sends a strong message to detention facility operators that California will be watching to ensure that they are treating every single person in their custody with the humanity they deserve.

The budget action tasks the state Attorney General with monitoring all detention facilities in California, including conditions of confinement, standards of care and circumstances around apprehension and transfer. These reviews will occur over the next 10 years, with findings made available to the public. The first report is due by March 1, 2019.

AB 103 perfectly complements SB 29, the Dignity Not Detention Act, which seeks to remove California’s municipalities from the business of private immigration detention altogether. With support from a statewide coalition of groups, including the California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance (CIYJA), the Immigrant Youth Coalition (IYC), and Human Rights Watch (HRW), SB 29 is currently in the Assembly and will be heard in the Assembly Judiciary Committee. SB 29 is authored by California State Senator Ricardo Lara (D – Bell Gardens) and co-sponsored by the Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC) and Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC). The ILRC and CIVIC advocated for and consulted on the immigration detention provisions in today’s state budget action.

California State Senator Ricardo Lara said:

“I want to congratulate both the Legislature and the Governor for standing up for our most vulnerable and sending a different message than what the federal government is sending to our immigrant communities. This isn’t really about immigration — this is about human rights and assuring that we uphold our American constitutional values.”

Christina Fialho, an attorney and the Co-Executive Director at Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC) said:

“While our ultimate goal is to abolish immigration detention nationwide, this is a powerful first step in a state with the largest immigrant population in the country. California holds the most immigrants after Texas, and about a quarter of all people in immigration detention pass through California detention facilities each year. What we do here in California has a direct effect on the national immigration detention context. While California cannot end immigration detention on its own, California can lead the way. We hope that this bill inspires others states to step up to ensure that the Trump administration’s cold-hearted attempt to jail even more immigrants does not become a reality.”

“The Attorney General of California now has the power and resources to oversee an industry that has operated with impunity for far too long. Hunger strikers and other immigrants in detention face physical assault on almost a daily basis in California. CIVIC’s investigation into sexual and physical assault found that out of the 4,500 complaints lodged with Homeland Security’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) in California, OIG investigated less than 1 percent. If the federal government won’t regulate its detention facilities, the state of California will provide its own oversight over immigration detention facilities.”

“These are groundbreaking advancements in our nation’s troubled immigration detention landscape. This law will be the first in the United States to give a state agency the power to monitor immigration detention facility conditions and makes California the only state in the country to put a moratorium on the expansion of immigration detention.”

“California prides itself on the just and humane treatment of all of its residents, and immigrants are no exception. While California cannot work alone to fix our impractical federal immigration system, including its abuse-ridden detention arm, our state’s leaders have committed themselves to advancing commonsense policies such as SB 87/AB 103 that underscore our collective values of fair and compassionate treatment, welcoming and diversity.”

To request an interview with any of the individuals above, please contact Kemi Bello at kbello@ilrc.org.

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About the Immigrant Legal Resource Center

The Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC) is a national nonprofit that works with immigrants, community organizations, legal professionals, and policy makers to build a democratic society that values diversity and the rights of all people. Through community education programs, legal training & technical assistance, and policy development & advocacy, the ILRC’s mission is to protect and defend the fundamental rights of immigrant families and communities. www.ilrc.org

About Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement

Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC) is the national immigration detention visitation network, which is working to end U.S. immigration detention. CIVIC visits and monitors 43 of the largest immigration detention facilities in the country on a weekly basis and runs the largest national hotline for people in immigration detention. CIVIC is headquartered in California. www.endisolation.org

Adelanto, CA – It has now been 31 hours since nine individuals, known as the #Adelanto9, began a hunger strike at the Adelanto Detention Center in California yesterday morning. Within hours of refusing to eat food or drink water, the #Adelanto9 reported that they were drenched with pepper spray, beaten and transferred into a high security area by GEO Group (GEO) guards, the notorious private prison company that operates the facility.

“The retaliation that the #Adelanto9 endured as a result of their hunger strike is a shameful attempt to suppress efforts to expose the shocking realities of immigration detention from those inside,” said Tristan Call of Sureñxs En Acción. “The abusive lengths to which GEO has gone are appalling and endanger the well-being of those on hunger strike.”

The extreme force that the #Adelanto9 faced yesterday tragically affirm longstanding concerns of physical abuse by GEO staff and inadequate medical treatment raised by immigrant rights groups, including Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC), Detention Watch Network and Inland Empire-Immigrant Youth Collective, which have continually called for the facility’s closure. Most alarmingly, Adelanto became the deadliest detention center in 2017, with three deaths in three months. To date, ICE has failed to respond to demands that the findings of the investigations into these deaths be made public.

“ICE and its contractors like GEO Group operate with impunity in California. Hunger strikers and other immigrants in detention face physical assault on almost a daily basis in California. CIVIC’s investigation into sexual and physical assault found that out of the 4,500 complaints lodged with Homeland Security’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) in California, OIG investigated less than 1 percent. If the federal government won’t regulate its detention facilities, it is time for the state of California to provide its own oversight over immigration detention facilities,” said Christina Fialho, a California-based attorney and co-executive director of Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC).

“The hunger strike stresses what advocates have long been saying — ICE and GEO are unfit to take care of people in their custody,” said Mitzie Perez of Inland Empire-Immigrant Youth Collective. “Adelanto must be shut down.”

The #Adelanto9 follow a 2015 hunger strike at Adelanto and a massive hunger strike at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, Washington earlier this year, a facility that is also run by GEO. The growing pattern of hunger strikes within immigration detention centers paints a grim picture of life inside detention as people detained risk their health and retaliation to expose egregious conditions and system-wide abuses.

“The Adelanto Detention Center exemplifies the systemic abuses found throughout detention centers nationwide, ” said Danny Cendejas, organizing director of Detention Watch Network. “We stand in solidarity with the #Adelanto9 as they put their bodies on the line to expose the injustices not just within Adelanto, but system-wide.”

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Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC) is the national immigration detention visitation network, which is working to end U.S. immigration detention by monitoring human rights abuses, elevating stories, building community-based alternatives to detention, and advocating for system change. We have been visiting and monitoring the Adelanto Detention Facility since 2012. For more information, visit www.endisolation.org.

Detention Watch Network (DWN) is a national coalition of organizations and individuals working to expose and challenge the injustices of the United States’ immigration detention and deportation system and advocate for profound change that promotes the rights and dignity of all persons. Founded in 1997 by immigrant rights groups, DWN brings together advocates to unify strategy and build partnerships on a local and national level to end immigration detention. Visit www.detentionwatchnetwork.org. Follow @DetentionWatch.

Inland Empire-Immigrant Youth Collective (IE-IYC) is a grassroots undocumented youth-led organization. We are committed to creating a safe space for immigrant youth regardless of legal status, race, gender, sexuality, educational background and other intersections that are crucial to the undocumented identity. We have been supporting regional efforts against the Adelanto Detention Facility since 2013. For more information, visit www.ieiyc.org.

Sureñxs En Acción is a Nashville-based migrant liberation collective organizing against immigrant detention, state violence, and for-profit prisons in the US South and the Global South.